Beading.Beadwork.Beads

Finished Projects in the New Year 2011

Look! Finished projects! It feels really good to get stuff done, right?

The above photos are of Josephine's Button Bracelet. I finished this sometime in December before Christmas.

Then, I finished this:

It's bead embroidery around window beads linked together into a bracelet. The clasp is a beaded toggle bar with several loops so the size is adjustable.

Last night, I FINALLY finished this:

 

The bracelet above is my take on Diane Dennis's Fire Mountain Bracelet. The cabs are polymer clay, and I bought them online years and years ago--I don't remember the artist's name, unfortunately. The cylinder beads are Toho Aikos, #618 (yummy), and Toho size 15 rounds. The accent beads are glass and wood from my stash. 

I go back to college starting today (persuing a third degree), so I think I won't be quite as productive as I have been in the past few weeks. :o)

Campin' 'n' Beadin'

My DH and I went camping this past weekend. As we drove farther into the countryside, he noticed that the Gs at the ends of my words were disappearin'.

This is what I brought with me:

It's Josephine's Button Bracelet by Melanie L. Doerman in the February/March 2008 issue of Beadwork. It's great to work in sunlight! I'll post more photos of the project as soon as I get it finished. I have some gorgeous vintage buttons, and this is a good project for them as it doesn't require that the shank be removed. Also, it's a good exercise in odd-count flat peyote.

Here's the view from the campsite:

I love autumn.

Mid-July Finished Object!

Over the weekend, I finally finished these:

   

They are the Symmetry in Motion Earrings, designed by Cynthia Rutledge. Cynthia was at my bead shop, Bead Obsessions, for four days in March 2010, and this is one of the three classes she taught.

Recent Finished Objects, June 2010

Occasionally, I like to show what I've actually managed to finish. Here's the latest thing I started and finished:

My DH asked me to make this for him to take to a retirement party at work. Sadly, I won't even get a bite of this! Next to beads and yarn, food it my second favorite thing to do (beads and yarn are tied for first).We'll see how this looks after it's out of the oven--hopefully it will by photo worthy.

My latest beaded finished object can be seen to the right.

It is a bead embroidery pendant. The focal is a Greek ceramic disc from Mykonos Beads, which are available at Bead Obsessions. The rest of the beads are from Bead Obsessions and out of my stash: Toho size 15 rounds, size 8 rounds, and Aikos; Miyuki size 3 bugles and Delicas; Czech size 11 rounds; and various other beads I've picked up from gods know where.

I created the bezel with a base row of back stitching, then built from that with peyote stitch. The rest of the embroidery includes more back stitching, stop stitches, bucle stitches, satin stitches, and just sewing on embellishment beads. The edging is done in brick stitch with Czech 11 rounds, and then embellished with Toho 15 rounds. The strap is made from some of the beads used in the embroidery, including the bugles.

Details on bead embroidery are definitely a topic of future posts!

You can see other photos of this piece here.

Isn't bead embroidery cool? My work is very much influenced and inspired by Sherry Serafini.

This is my purse from the handbag purse class with Sherry:

 

This is a pendant I stitched using one of Sherry's kits:

   

This is a detail photo of the class sample I stitched for the bead embroidery class I teach at Bead Obsessions:

 

OK, so how did that pie turn out?

Good enough to eat!